Until Harry (30 page)

He exhaled. “I’m sorry, darling. I just reacted when I didn’t find you next to me.”

My stomach burst with butterflies.

I leaned back and smiled up at him. “I’ll get right back into your bed next to you as soon as we eat.”

“Sounds good to me,” he said, lips curved upwards.

He kissed my nose, turned my body away from him, then slapped my behind, forcing me into a walk. I yelped, and Kale laughed.

“My clothes look good on you,” he murmured as I walked in front of him and took the turn into the kitchen.

I chuckled. “You’re just saying that because I’ve nothing underneath it.”

Arms came around my waist as I continued to prepare our sandwiches, and through the material of Kale’s T-shirt, he palmed my breasts, causing me to moan as my nipples hardened.

“You won’t wear anything else when you’re here,” he murmured in my ear. “That’s
my
condition.”

I snorted. “Does everyone have a condition for me to abide by around here?”

Kale laughed and kissed the back of my head, lowering his hands to my hips. “It looks that way.”

I leaned my head back against his chest and smiled. “Luckily, these conditions are something I can tolerate.”

Kale’s chuckle was a low rumble that caused his chest to vibrate. A comfortable silence fell between us as we ate our sandwiches and leaned against the kitchen counter, Kale holding me with one arm and his sandwich with the other.

“Do you feel like we’ve said everything that needs to be said?”
I q
uestioned when we finished eating.

Kale shook his head as he sat at the kitchen table. “You explained to me why you did what you did, and while I’m not happy over it, I understand it. I know you need me to explain my part in all this, but first I want you to hear something that I truly mean from the bottom of my heart.”

I licked my lips. “Okay.”

“Laney Baby,” he whispered as I sat on his lap and put my arms around his neck, “I’ve never said this to you while sober, but I am in love with you. I have been for a very long time, and I’m sorry for not telling you sooner.”

The words I had dreamt of him saying for so long suddenly felt too hard to hear.

“Pup,” I murmured, my lower lip trembling.

“Be mine,” he pressed. “Be my girlfriend, my fiancée, my wife. Please, say you’ll be my everything because you already are.”

He’s proposing to me?
My head swayed as emotion, and utter disbelief, filled me.

“Isn’t this too soon?” I asked, feeling like I was having an out-of-body experience. “We’ve only been back in each other’s lives for
four
days—”

“It’s long overdue, darling,” Kale interrupted. “I should have asked you to marry me years ago.”

I swallowed. “I don’t want to rush into anything you’ll regret.”

He placed his hands on either side of my face and said, “I have
never
and will
never
regret anything about you. You’re the love of my life, and I’m sorry I didn’t realise it sooner. I’m sorry I let you think
I r
egretted you; it was the only way I could think at the time to scare you away from me.”

I almost fell off of his lap, causing his grip on me to tighten and keep me in place.

“What do you mean?” I asked, my heart pounding.

He brushed my hair out of my face and searched my eyes wi
th his.

“I remember everything about the night you gave yourself to me,” he said, shocking the hell out of me. “You were right: I wasn’t
that
drunk. The drink just gave me the courage to be with you in the way I wanted to be. I was harsh and blunt with you to make you mad at me, so you wouldn’t want anything to do with me in that way. I wanted you to believe I regretted making love to you.”

I blinked as a veil of confusion fell over me. “I don’t understand?”

Does he really not regret us being together?

“I was afraid of . . . of what your parents, my parents, your uncle and your brothers would think of me.” He angrily shook his head. “I didn’t want to lose your family from my life, and I thought they’d hate me if we got together. You told me you thought you were dirty for having romantic feelings about me because we were so close, and I felt the exact same way. I felt like I was taking advantage of your crush.”

My crush.

“It wasn’t a crush, Kale,” I whispered. “I loved you.”

He swallowed. “Is that still past tense?”

Tell him.

I shook my head. “I’ve never stopped loving you. You’re embedded deep in my bones. I’d never love anyone as much as I love you in the
way
I love you.”

“What way do you love me?” he asked, nervously biting his lower lip.

My lip twitched. “Not like a brother.”

He glanced at our bodies, relaxed from lovemaking, and laughed.
The sound warmed my heart.

“Marry me, Lane,” he almost begged. “I promise to love,
cherish
and care for you until my last breath. Please, be mine.”

He stared at me as if I had to even think about it.

“Yes,” I nodded, my body trembling. “Yes, I’ll marry you.”

We kissed then, and I broke it off with a laugh.

“What’s funny?” Kale asked, amused.

I shook my head. “I’m just wondering what my brothers and everyone else will think about this. Hey, guess what? Kale and I are getting married – surprise!”

Not that I cared what reactions we’d get, but I was still intrigued.

“Lane,” – Kale chuckled – “your brothers have known I have loved you for
years
.”

My jaw fell open.

“Yeah,” he said, smiling at my expression, “I told them a few months after Kaden died. I told them what happened between us; I told them what I said to you, what I did to hurt you in order to turn you off me.”

“What did they say?” I asked, completely taken back.

Kale snorted. “They told me I was a fucking idiot, which I am, for thinking that they would turn their backs on me. They said they would give their left arms to ensure you ended up with someone like me because they knew I’d never treat you badly, and I’d love you more than life itself. They said they’d be happy for us to b
e t
ogether.”

“They did? Wow.”

Kale nodded. “Even though they knew I loved you, they were sure you wouldn’t come home, so they tried to push me into dating again, but it didn’t interest me.”

I stared at him. “Are you telling me you haven’t been with anyone since you and Drew broke up?”

That would be years if he said yes.

“Why?” I asked when he nodded.

“I decided to wait for you to come home,” he murmured.

“Why?”
I pressed.

Kale licked his very tempting lips. “So I could make my play for you and try to win your heart back because I’m its rightful owner.”

He was undoing me. “I can’t believe you’re saying this.”

He took my hands in his. “It’s the truth, darling. I’ve been waiting for you for the last five years. I’d have waited fifty if that’s what it took.”

“I feel like this is a dream,” I said with a shake of my head. “You’re telling me everything I have always wanted to hear.”

He smiled. “We can have everything we’ve always wanted together now.”

I began to tremble.

“We’re really doing this?” I asked as pure joy filled me. “We’re really going to be together?”

“Until my dying breath,” Kale vowed.

My heart didn’t know what to do; it was feeling something other than heartbreak for once and was close to shutting down.
I p
ressed my forehead against his.

“The day you left, it took me all of two seconds to realise I’d die for you,” he murmured.

Oh.

With a shaky breath I said, “I’ve been dying slowly, waiting for you, and I mean this quite literally – I can’t live without you.”

“You won’t,” Kale swore, pressing his forehead against mine. “I’ll be with you until the day my heart thumps its last beat. You’re everything to me. Do you understand that? Every. Fucking. Thing.”

Tears seeped from my eyes and splashed onto my cheeks.

“I love you so much.”

Kale smiled wide. “I love you too, Laney Baby, and to think we have your uncle to thank for bringing us back together,” he said as he nuzzled his nose to mine.

I smiled warmly. “I miss him dearly.”

“I know you do, sweetheart, but we’ll see him again. We’ll see your Aunt Teresa, Lavender and Kaden too.” He nudged his nose into my neck. “We have a lot to look forward to as we grow old, darling.”

I was going to grow old with Kale.

My
Kale.

I joyfully smiled. “We do.”

“Things would have been so different if you’d never come home,” he murmured, his arm tightening around me.

“I know,” I said, nodding against him. “Things would have never changed.”

“Until Harry?” Kale questioned, kissing my shoulder.

“Yeah,” I smiled warmly, closing my eyes as I bathed in the love my future husband freely gave to me. “Until Harry.”

We were silent as we basked in the touch of one another.

“You’re my soon-to-be
Mrs Kale Hunt
,” Kale murmured.

I didn’t know why, but I burst into laughter as I thought back to the times I’d scribbled those exact words all over my school journals and notebooks, wishing that one day those words would come true. Little did I know that day would come. Getting to it wouldn’t be easy, but it would come, and I would be happy. Nothing else, just really bloody happy.

And you know something? My Uncle Harry was right.
I d
eserved it.

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

Day one of forever

N
anny?” I said when I walked up the pathway of York
Cemetery
later that blissful and life-changing day and found my
grandmother
standing in front of my aunt and uncle’s grave.

She looked over her shoulder and smiled. “Hello, me darlin’.”

I put my arm around her waist and gave her a squeeze before standing by her side. “Are you okay?” I asked her.

She shrugged. “I’m okay as I can be.”

I leaned in and kissed her temple before resting my head against hers. We stayed that way for a few minutes until my nanny spoke. “Lane,” she began. “I miss me son,” she said sorrowfully, “and I am sad that he is gone, but I’m also very happy that ye have come hom
e ta
us. I know Harry would have been over the moon with your decision, sweetheart.”

I gave her another squeeze. “I’m just so sorry that it took me so long. I don’t have everything figured out yet, but I’m getting there. I wish things didn’t take so long to come to pass, though. I’ll forever be regretful for that.”

My nanny turned me to face her. “Listen ta me, Lane Edwards: ye did what you needed ta do at the time for
you
. Ye aren’t a machin
e –
you’re a human, and you’re no better at figurin’ life out than the rest of us are.” She reached for my hands and rubbed her thumbs over my knuckles, instantly relaxing me.

“I am so sorry for how we all reacted when ye broke your news about leavin’, and I wish we could take it back, but ye were meant ta leave, and we were meant ta fight ye over it. Everythin’ that has happened, the good, the bad, and the downright horrible, has led ta this moment. It was meant ta be, darlin’. Fate is a funny thing, and ye have no control over it. Ye can’t even expla
in it.”

“You just ride the journey that is life out and see where it takes you?” I asked, quoting her.

A beautiful smile overtook her face. “Exactly, and the sooner we all get that, the sooner petty things take a back seat to what really matters. Family. Friends. The things nobody should live without. You don’t know what life has in store for you, sweetheart. Harry is a prime example that you have to live in the now, and stop dwellin’ in the past. People create their happiness, but they also create their destruction. Live the life you want.”

“You think people have that much control over their lives?”
I q
uizzed.

My nanny lightly shook her head. “No, no one has control over their life span – that’s out of our hands. But we can get a rein on how we feel while we ride this journey out. You just have to want it enough, or else happiness will pass you by, your life right along with it.

“You have your family right behind you, willin’ to help you every step of the way. You don’t have to run anymore. You can stand still and face everythin’ head on, with us right along with you.”

You don’t have to run anymore.
I repeated that particular sentence over and over in my mind.

I always knew that when I moved away, I was really running away, but I wasn’t strong enough to do anything else at the time. Staying wasn’t an option for me after life went to hell with Kale, and to hell in general. My heart ached every time I saw him, and I figured if he was out of sight, he would be out of mind.

Man,
I silently sighed,
how wrong I was
.

Out of everything that was sour in my life, I hated my uncle being dead the most, but I couldn’t travel any further along the path of despair that I’d paved for myself. If I wanted to feel something other than numbness, and sometimes sadness, I had to take my nanny’s earlier advice and create my own happiness. I had to be there for myself. I had to take care of myself. I had to be my own rock, my own drive.

Being with Kale and having everything I’d always wanted gave me purpose, but I refused to allow him, or our new relationship, to be my only drive in life. I couldn’t become so dependent on other people; in the past it broke me when they went away.

I blinked and tore myself from my thoughts, and I found my nanny staring at me.

“You look like you’ve decided somethin’,” she mused.

I swallowed. “I did. I decided to create my own happiness.”

My nanny smiled brightly at me. “I knew you would.”

I released a shaky breath. “A few minutes in your presence, Yoda, and you have already turned my life around.”

“Turned your life around, you did,” she said, doing her best Yoda impression, making my lips curl upward. “I just gave you the little kick up the arse that you needed.”

I smiled. “I’ve always thought I wasn’t strong, but I’m beginning to see what Uncle Harry and you all see in me. In my own way, I’m a fighter.”

“Your uncle shared a lot about you with me. He told me about your therapist spell and other things you got up to in the city, and let me tell you, you are strong.
You
decided to take action when you had those thoughts.
You
got help.
You
decided to stop your partyin’ ways after you were attacked.
You
made a decision to help you cope with losin’ Lavender and Kale. And now
you
have made a decision to come home and face everythin’ head on. You’re the strongest person I have
ever
known, sweetheart.”

I let my nanny’s words sink in, and smiled when I understood she was echoing what Kale had said to me earlier. They were right. I was strong.

I. Was. Strong.

Without speaking, I looked to my aunt and uncle’s grave but looked back to my nanny when she touched my arm and said, “Your father is coming to pick me up. We’ll wait out in the car park f
or yo
u. You take as much time as you need with your uncle.
I imagine
you have a few things to say to the sneaky fecker.”

I chuckled as I watched my nanny walk away, before I returned my attention to the earth before me. “You knew this would pan out the way it did, didn’t you, Uncle Harry?” I saw my uncle’s smiling face in my mind, and it caused me to chuckle. “I owe everything to you,” I said with a firm nod. “You changed my entire life, and I will forever be grateful to you.”

My lower lip trembled then. “I won’t lie; I’m hurt and angry with you for not telling me about your heart condition.” I swiped away a stray tear as it fell from my eye. “I would have come home sooner. I would have helped you. I would have been here fo
r you.”

I sniffled. “I know that you had your reasons, and while I may not know them all or even understand them, I’m confident you felt it wasn’t the time for me to come back here yet. You were always the wise one in the family, and with you gone we’re all bound to make some pretty risky decisions, but I hope you’ll stay with us a
nd help guide us
in the right direction whenever we need a l
ittle n
udge.”

I felt a cool breeze wrap around me, and it almost took my breath away.

“You’re definitely one of the loves of my life, and I’ll forever miss you.” I smiled, saddened. “Wait for me up there, okay? Your face is the first I want to see when it’s my time.”

I felt at peace with my uncle at that moment, and it was one of the best feelings I had ever experienced. When I turned and walked away from my uncle’s grave, I had a smile on my face. I loved and missed him more than I could handle, and while I would forever wish to hold him just one more time, I knew that I’d get the chance to do it again one day.

I glanced over my shoulder as I walked away, and what I saw couldn’t logically be explained. Maybe it was my mind or heart playing tricks on me. I saw my uncle sitting on top of his gravestone, with his arms around the waist of my Aunt Teresa and her head thrown back against his shoulder as she laughed with glee. Behind my uncle, I saw Lavender, who was dancing around in the grass and flowers with a small child in her arms, a child that looked exactly like Kaden. He was laughing with delight as he was spun round and round.

I stopped and stared for a second, and when my uncle locked his eyes on mine, he winked, and it sent shivers up my spine. They faded away then, my Aunt Teresa, Kaden and then Lavender. My uncle hung around a little longer, as if to see me off safely, and it made me smile. I decided then that I didn’t want to see him fade away, because I knew he’d never be truly gone; I’d carry him around in my heart forever.

I smiled at him once more, then turned around and began to walk away, each step making me feel lighter than the last. Making me feel complete.

“I’ll see you later, Uncle Harry.”

THE END